Anglican women encouraged to 'stand up straight for Christ'
Episcopal News Service. February 25, 2008 [022508-02]
Daphne Mack
In a lively homily, the Rt. Rev. Catherine S. Roskam, bishop suffragan of New York, told Anglican women from around the Communion gathered at the Episcopal Church Center in New York City to "stand up straight for Christ."
Roskam, and the Rt. Rev. Laura J. Ahrens, bishop suffragan of Connecticut who served as celebrant, participated in the February 22 opening Eucharist for the Anglican delegation to the 52nd session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (UNCSW). This year's session, themed "Financing for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women," runs February 25 - March 7 at United Nations headquarters, in New York City.
In delivering her sermon, Roskam physically acted out the Gospel reading from Luke 13:10-17 of a "woman with a spirit that had crippled her for 18 years . . . and was bent over and was quite unable to stand straight" until Jesus healed her.
"Jesus called us into this gathering to be women who stand up straight because we follow Jesus," she told the delegates, "And for freedom, Christ has set us free."
Jesus "broke rules," she stated but "compassion trumps rules all the time."
"Compassion is why Jesus broke all the rules and the biggest one he broke was the rule that death is the end," she explained. "We can stand up, because he stood up on the third day, and know that none of those forces that work against compassion will have the last say."
Economic empowerment
This is the fifth year that the Anglican Women's Empowerment (AWE), as representatives of the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) Observer's Office to the UNCSW, will participate in the UNCSW gathering.
The theme of economic empowerment came about after the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. Those gathered will attempt to increase attention to information and data needs, enhance capacity to mainstream the issue and identify key policy initiatives to move implementation forward.
"The whole question of economics is a major issue for women not only in the developing world but also in the so called developed world," said the Rev. Margaret Rose, director of the Office of Women's Ministries for the Episcopal Church and its newly appointed director of Mission Leadership. "We need to open our eyes and have very acute vision about what is happening with budgets, economics, and what the choices of our government and parishes are."
Meagan Morrison, a delegate from Australia, agreed, saying the topic is "incredibly important" and that the free trade agreements that so many countries are now entering into financial policies that have such an "impact on women."
"One of the issues in Australia is that a lot of women are in only casual or part-time employment," she explained. "Budgeting does not include the care profession so people working with children or the elderly or the disabled do not get paid. But they provide a huge input to the economy because they are not drawing on resources of public amenity."
Morrison said hopes she will be able to return home and "help implement what is learned here."
"The topic of gender financing is very important but there is still a lot of work to do," said Nangula Kathindi, a delegate from Namibia. "As far as I'm concerned, we are not only talking about women's issues here, we are talking about men and women and boys and girls . . . that means all of society."
AWE delegates will also participate in a series of activities more specific to the Anglican understanding of gender equity and its relationship to human and social development. These activities include a four-hour interactive workshop where delegates will create, analyze, and measure gender equity in budgets.
The delegates will also participate in a facilitated interactive World Café, sharing their insights, experiences, challenges, and short-and long-term goals related to financing for gender equity and the empowerment of women.
Part of the discussion will focus on how to continue the efforts around this issue and how to continue the dialogue and sharing of information between delegates once they return home. In addition, each delegate will receive a tool-kit providing a "nuts and bolt" approach to financing for gender-equity as well as key resources.
"This year we are producing a gender budgeting curriculum for the Anglican Communion with the women here collectively," said Phoebe Griswold, one of the founding members of AWE. "Women will know that if we don't have some say in how resources are spent, then the things that we want to happen won't happen."
Mutuality
"I think that all of these women who came together have a job to do and the job is about the work of empowering the people in their country to take care of themselves and heal the world," said Rose.
Griswold said that AWE "is now growing up and holds the heart of the Communion."
"These women want more than anything to do mission at the grassroots level, and to learn how to be in the seat of authority so that they can better lead the Communion," she said.
Christina Hing, also a founding member of AWE, said the yearly gatherings provide a "sense of connectedness with the women in the whole Anglican Communion."
"It really is about the diversity of gifts coming together, for a unified goal of claiming that God's mission is about making sure that the hungry are fed and the poor are educated," explained Rose. "That doesn't mean that it's something the U.S. gives to somebody else. It's something that we are in solidarity and mutuality about. So this gathering is two weeks of mutuality."